


green means go, so run

by seinmit



Series: Writing the Rainbow [5]
Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: 5+1 Things, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Bathing/Washing, Fluff, Frottage, Infinity Saga Never Happened, M/M, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Sex with One Person Clothed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-13
Updated: 2019-12-13
Packaged: 2021-02-25 21:07:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21751966
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seinmit/pseuds/seinmit
Summary: Bucky had never been what you’d call modest, but sometime in the last seventy years, whatever sense of self-restraint that had kept his clothes on in private had vanished. Steve would be sad about the traumatic circumstances or whatever, but he was too busy trying not to spend most of his life fire-engine red.Five times Steve complained about Bucky taking off his clothes (and one time he didn't.)
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Series: Writing the Rainbow [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1567993
Comments: 29
Kudos: 439
Collections: Writing Rainbow Green





	green means go, so run

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lionessvalenti](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lionessvalenti/gifts).



> Let's be basic together!
> 
> Set in a vague, post-Civil War New York future that lives in my heart.
> 
> Thanks to G. for looking this over, you're a delight. 
> 
> I changed the title of this a couple hours after posting, because the emoji wasn't showing up on some browsers. Sorry if that's confusing! Current title from [The Toll of the Sea](https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/57884/the-toll-of-the-sea) by Sally Wen Mao.

### 1.

Bucky had never been what you’d call modest, but sometime in the last seventy years, whatever sense of self-restraint that had kept his clothes on in private had vanished. Steve would be sad about the traumatic circumstances or whatever, but he was too busy trying not to spend most of his life fire-engine red.

Bucky’d get back home after going to therapy or visiting Sam, and immediately take off his pants. It wouldn’t be a production, not exactly, but the quiet sigh of relief he always made when undoing his button fly felt as loud as a jet engine to Steve. 

"If you wore your pants less tight, maybe you could stand to wear them more often," Steve said, half-desperate. 

Bucky rolled his eyes and purposefully ruffled Steve’s hair on his way to get a snack from the kitchen. 

"I like to look good, Steve," he said. "I know that's an incomprehensible choice for you." 

"Natasha said I was getting better," Steve replied, sniffily. Bucky looked over his shoulder with a degree of fond condescension on his face that was unwarranted, frankly. 

"She just likes that your shirts don't fit," he said. He pulled off his own shirt and stretched, scratching his stomach. Steve couldn’t help but zero in on the path of hair peeking out from the waistband of his briefs. He told himself it was jealousy—something about _his_ serum made him almost hairless. 

"I got the size that I was told to purchase by a _professional_ ," Steve said. 

"And the people are very grateful for her little white lies," Bucky said. "But you have nothing to stand on when complaining about things being too tight." 

He took out the jug of orange juice and swigged it, right from the bottle. Steve was tempted to complain about this different instance of bad roommate behavior, but he didn’t dare—he did the same thing. Sam despaired for them both.

### 2.

Later, he tried again, as Bucky was turning up the heat. It was getting cold and even the heavy brick brownstone they lived in managed to let in some chill. Steve found himself on a quest to plug the last draft, but he figured it was just the nature of buildings to let in the cold. 

Bucky, due to his incessant nudity, kept the heat outrageously high. 

"It’s already at 72," Steve said. 

"And now it is at 78," Bucky said. His voice was peaceable. He was in a tight pair of boxer-briefs and nothing else. 

Steve squawked. "Bucky!"

Bucky shrugged. "We can afford it now. Why be cold?" 

"You wouldn’t have to be cold if you _wore clothes_." 

"I want to not be cold and not wear clothes," Bucky said. "I'm traumatized, Steve. Cold brings me back to the cryo tube." 

Steve instantly had the urge to let it go, not wanting to be insensitive—judging by Bucky’s sunny smile, he knew exactly that. 

"It’s weird that you use your trauma to win arguments like this," Steve said, sour. 

Bucky’s smile went crooked. 

"Hey," he said. "At least there’s an upside, right?" 

Steve didn’t have a reply to that.

### 3.

"Do you have HYDRA related trauma about your pants?" Steve said, out of nowhere. 

Sam looked both delighted and scandalized—a typical response when Steve gave Bucky shit. 

Bucky looked down at himself. To be fair, he was wearing shorts today—even if they were tight bike shorts and not meaningfully different than just underwear, in Steve’s humble opinion. 

He raised his eyes and met Steve’s glare head-on. 

"Are my scars that offensive to you?" he said, mild. 

Steve’s face went hot for a different reason than usual. 

"No—what, Bucky. I specifically complained about your _pants_ , your scars are covered by your _shirt_ and your thighs are perfect."

He hadn’t really meant to say that last part, but it put a grin on Bucky’s face and so at the end of the day, it was probably worth it. 

"Glad you think so, Rogers," he said. "I'm learning to love my body again." 

Steve was pretty sure that soulful tone was nothing but bullshit, but his chest tightened because of it anyway. Bucky had a habit of saying the truth in a way that came off as a lie, big puppy-dog eyes concealing his actual plea. 

He couldn’t help himself—he didn’t have that type of genteel social duplicity. 

“I’m really glad, Buck,” he said. It was very sincere.

Bucky made a face of discomfort, theatrically shuddering and retreating to his room. 

“Y’all are weird,” Sam said. 

“Drink your orange juice,” Steve said, pouring him another glass.

### 4.

“Jesus, what are you doing?” Steve said. 

Bucky was mumbling nonsense, inaudible underneath the noise of the fire that was engulfing the HYDRA base. It was a hundred meters from them, give or take, but Steve could still feel the heat and hear the crashing sounds of the building falling down. It wasn’t as loud as a helicopter, but Bucky was speaking very quietly. 

As he was muttering, he was clumsily taking off his body-armor. His hands were white, blood trickling down the end of his sleeve and dripping off his finger-tips, and the behavior was strange enough that it sent a spike of worry through Steve. 

He reached out, grabbing Bucky’s hand away from his buckles. 

“Don’t do that, buddy. I think we got everybody, but maybe not." 

_And if you’re bleeding out, you should keep the pressure of the armor._ He didn’t say that out loud. 

Bucky kept trying to free his hands, but not very hard. It was easy enough for Steve to keep catching them, gently drawing them away from the armor. 

“C’mon,” Steve said. “Stop.” 

Bucky looked up at him, hair having escaped its tie-back and sticking to his sweaty skin. His pupils were dilated black, only the thinnest sliver of blue visible. 

He smiled, disconcertingly sunny, and pushed his metal hand out of Steve’s grasp to nudge his shoulder. 

“Hey, Steve,” he said. He sounded drunk. Steve hoped it was whatever gas they’d been hit with and not blood loss. He reached out to check if his skin had the distinctive cold clamminess of shock and Bucky’s smile went even brighter. 

“Steve,” he repeated, insistent. “ _Steve_." 

“I’m right here, pal,” he said. 

Bucky cupped his face with his hand, rubbing his thumb over Steve's skin. He had blood on his teeth and, this close, Steve could smell it on his skin. Steve held his breath, half in the desire not to smell it. 

Bucky leaned in, slow—and passed out, slumped down on Steve's shoulder.

### 5.

Someone was clearly trying to be very stealthy, but there was no disguising the sound of water turning on in the shower.

Steve rolled his eyes and got off the couch, making his way to the bathroom. He didn’t bother knocking and pushed his way in. 

Bucky was naked, the stark white of his bandages running down his side. Steve was glad to see no red, at the very least, and the wound gave something he was able to focus on instead of all that skin. 

“First, you’re supposed to be on bed rest. Second, you know and I know that’s not a waterproof dressing. Third—”

“Steve Rogers, you’re a fucking hypocrite," Bucky said. His feet were planted and his knees were locked in the way of a man who wanted to project the ability to stand up straight. Steve was filled with fondness at the stubborn jut of his jaw. 

“Bucky Barnes, you’re going to fall over." 

“No, ‘m not,” he said. He was listing, just a little bit. He stabilized himself with a hip against the counter. “I’m filthy.” 

Steve sympathized—the doctors would clean up around the wound-site, but they had too much to do to actually make anybody feel _clean_. It was a crappy feeling, and he knew Bucky in particular was fastidious about washing missions off of himself. The decision was easy, in the end. Inconvenient feelings or no, this was something he could do to help his friend. 

“Sit,” he said, reaching out to Bucky and urging him by the shoulders to sit on the closed lid of the toilet. Bucky went easy—the way he blinked up at him sent a pang through Steve’s heart, reminiscent of his cheerful doped up response to pain and drugs while they were still on the mission. 

“This is your fault,” Steve said. “If you had listened to me, you'd have been well out of the way of that shot.” 

“The hypocrisy never ends,” Bucky muttered, but he didn't sound upset about it. He leaned back, eyes falling closed and head resting against the tile. For some reason, the long line of his neck was the most compelling thing, even with the rest of him on display. Steve had to look at him, for a moment—dark hair, white tile, pinkness in his cheeks.

Steve forced himself to look away, turning off the shower and turning on the bath, carefully checking the temperature and wetting a washcloth when it was warm. 

When Steve ran it across Bucky’s chest, well out of the way of the bandage, Bucky flinched and Steve stopped dead. 

“Buck?” he said in a whisper. 

“Surprised me, that’s all,” Bucky replied. His eyes opened into slits and looked at Steve, through his lashes, head still tilted back. “Keep going. You volunteered and I’m still dirty.” 

Steve’s heart pounded. He licked his lips in order to be able to speak. 

“Sir yes sir,” he said. He thought he did a pretty good approximation of sarcasm with that. Bucky’s eyes sharpened, just for a moment, before he closed them again and sighed. 

They were quiet, as Steve continued to clean him. Every time the water cooled enough that Steve could feel the chill, he warmed it again. He wanted to make Bucky comfortable—that was the point of this. Never mind the way his nipples pebbled in the air or the tiny, almost imperceptible shivers he made at Steve’s touch. He was cleaning his friend off, because his friend couldn’t shower right now and needed to be clean. 

That’s what this was. It was on Steve that he couldn't stop looking at all the small details of Bucky’s body, so close and open underneath him. It was on Steve that the rough way that the cloth dragged over the scarring on Bucky’s chest went right to his gut. 

After he had wiped off Bucky’s upper body, Steve went to his knees and nudged Bucky’s thighs apart so he could wash his legs. He studiously avoided touching his dick or anything close, but that wasn’t enough to settle Steve down. He could feel his own cock, heavy in his pants, and he could smell Bucky’s sweat underneath antiseptic and blood. 

Bucky’s breathing picked up, as Steve worked, and when Steve glanced up he could see tension in his face, his eyes squeezed shut instead of simply closed. 

“Buck—” he started, before clearing his throat in an attempt to banish some of that roughness. “You okay?” 

“Yeah,” Bucky said. “Thanks.” 

His voice was low, too. From Steve’s position, he could see the muscles in Bucky’s thigh jump. Bucky spread his thighs wider and Steve ran the washcloth up. Bucky’s dick responded, ever so slightly, and his breath caught. 

Steve bit his own lip hard, impossibly tempted to lean further down and take him into his mouth. Bucky was _hurt_ and on painkillers. It was inappropriate. 

He paused, a long moment—caught in the image, though. His mouth was almost watering, he could taste it—

Something flickered in his peripheral vision and he looked up to see Bucky staring down at him, eyes dark. Their gaze met and held, the air vibrating between them. 

Steve—

Well. He chickened out. 

He sat back on his heels and said, "You're clean enough. Let's get you back to bed.” 

He dragged himself up and then helped Bucky to his feet, walking him to his room. His skin was hot and smooth underneath Steve’s hands, but he wasn’t thinking about it. 

At Bucky’s door, he shrugged off Steve's hold and looked at him, something wry on his face. 

“Okay, Steve,” he said. “I’m going to sleep for now."

If Steve heard some strange inflection on "for now," that was probably just his imagination.

### +1

Bucky healed fast. Within a few days, the stitches were out, the bandages were off, and the reason Steve could tell anything at all had happened was that there was a puckered, healing pink scar on his side. The only way he knew that, of course, was that Bucky seemingly had forgotten how to wear clothes entirely. 

He kept looking at it—and the rest of Bucky. Something had changed. Bucky’s nudity seemed more _directed_. Instead of taking his shirt off and tossing it on the couch, only paying attention to Steve after Steve started complaining that he was a slob, Bucky’d make full eye-contact before stripping down. 

They were on a precipice, even Steve could tell, and Steve knew he wasn’t all that bright about this sort of thing. But he was stubborn enough he didn’t want to act first and scared enough that he didn’t want to be the one to put himself out there, the one to make the first move and end the detente. 

The way Bucky was looking at him said that Bucky knew exactly what was going on in Steve’s head and it made Steve flush even deeper—Bucky, more than anyone, knew just how much of Steve’s bullheadedness could scarcely be differentiated from cowardice. 

Of course, it was Bucky that made the first move. Of course—it was always Bucky. 

Bucky pushed Steve down on the couch, wearing only jet black briefs, and climbed on Steve’s lap. Steve was instantly breathless, hands settling on Bucky’s hips to stabilize him, and he felt overwhelmed with the action—Bucky was always reaching out. It was a miracle, in its way, that he could still be the one to take the risk, after everything. 

“You’re a son of a bitch,” Bucky said. 

“Don’t talk about my ma like that,” Steve said out of sheer reflex. 

Bucky smiled and leaned in, brushed his face against Steve's. 

“Sarah was a saint,” he whispered into Steve's ear. "The only explanation for you is that you’re some kinda changeling.” 

Steve huffed a laugh, his fingers tracing the elastic of Bucky's waistband on their own accord. Bucky shifted, pointed, in Steve’s lap and Steve bit back a sound that wanted to be a moan. 

“I’m not kissing you first, Rogers," he said. "Man up, pal." 

Bucky always had his number. That was exactly what Steve needed. An acknowledgment that gave Steve permission to put himself out there and something that was undeniably a dare. 

Steve grabbed a thick handful of Bucky's hair, hand covering the bun entirely and sinking into his scalp and moved his head so that Steve could kiss him. 

Bucky’s mouth opened immediately underneath his, wet and hot and familiar—he tasted like the sugary cereal he liked as a snack and milk that wasn’t as good as it used to be. He tasted like stealing a bite of food, casual and homey. 

It was somehow the hottest moment of Steve's life anyway. 

The hand remaining on Bucky’s hip went to cup his ass and Steve squeezed, relishing the noise it pushed out of Bucky’s throat. 

Steve was in jeans and a sweater underneath Bucky and there was something particularly delicious about the way that Bucky looked, bare and vulnerable in his lap. It made Steve even hotter, made him kiss Bucky harder and dig his fingers into the light cotton of his underwear. 

“You’re still wearing clothes,” Steve said and it made Bucky laugh more than the statement deserved. 

“Changing your tune,” he murmured, leaning down to press a wet, open-mouthed kiss on Steve’s neck. 

“I never mind lookin’” Steve said, slipping his hand underneath Bucky's final scrap of clothing so he could touch skin, as soft and smooth as he thought it was going to be. “Just wasn’t sure I was allowed to.” 

“You’re exceptionally dumb,” Bucky said. He looked up and smiled at Steve, hair framing his face, so open and sweet. Steve could scarcely take it. 

He shifted his grip, grabbing Bucky's ass more firmly and wrapping his arm around Bucky’s shoulder to flip him around, depositing him on his back on the couch. 

Bucky’s eyes went wide and shocked, but his hips jerked up underneath Steve. Steve rubbed himself against him, knowing that the buttons of his jeans and the scratch of his wool sweater must feel intense for Bucky. 

Bucky shuddered, full-body, and arched up. Steve wanted him entirely bare—he shifted so he could get a handful of Bucky’s briefs, yanking hard enough that he shifted him on the couch but successfully ripping them off. 

“Jesus—” Bucky’s voice was harsh and satisfying, filling Steve with heat. He pushed his hips up into Steve and Steve flattened his hand over Bucky’s cock. His palm was big enough that he could nearly cover it entirely, pressing it down into Bucky’s body. He rubbed, pushing a gasp out of Bucky, and Bucky reached to grab Steve’s head and yank him back into a kiss. 

They kept kissing and kissing, mouths working until Steve could feel his lips start to bruise and sting from the intensity. Bucky wasn’t shy with either his teeth or his noises and both pricked Steve into more heightened arousal. 

Before long he was rolling his hips down into Bucky like he was fucking him, still fully dressed and sweating right through his undershirt. His jeans dug painfully into his hard cock, but he didn’t want to get undressed, the little bit of sharpness just making everything more sweet. 

Bucky came first, jerking away from Steve's kiss to gulp a breath of air, his entire body twisting underneath Steve and groaning, long and uninhibited. Steve picked up his pace, rocking hard enough against Bucky that the whole couch moved, and spilled hot into his jeans. 

He collapsed, fully on top of Bucky, and Bucky hooked a thigh around Steve’s hip to keep him there. 

There was a long moment where they just breathed, covered in sweat and come and the smell of damp fabric. 

“If you’re trying to get me to put on clothes, this was a bad move," Bucky said, finally. 

“Noted,” Steve said and went back to kissing him.


End file.
